So are the other towns and school districts that make up the 163rd state House District. The truth is, the same could be said for all of Delaware County.

Itís called clout.

Nick Micozzie is calling it a career.

The Republican has represented the 163rd District in Harrisburg for 36 years, and served on Upper Darby Council for 16 years before that.

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The name has become synonymous with Upper Darby politics. His son Tom now serves as mayor.

Very few people understand the way Harrisburg works as well as Nick Micozzie. Thatís how, time and again, he was able to deliver the goods for his constituents. A lot of politicians talk about constituent service. Nick Micozzie usually let his actions speak for themselves.

Nobody brought home the bacon quite like Nick Micozzie, who doggedly fought for the people of Upper Darby, Aldan, Clifton Heights and Lansdowne, as well as parts of Darby Township and Ridley Township.

Just last week, Micozzie was holding court at Secane Train Station, with Gov. Tom Corbett in tow, announcing a $21 million expansion project that will include an additional 60 parking spaces and eventually a new platform.

The project is one of the first tangible results of the massive $2.3 billion transportation funding package that was passed by the Legislature in December. It was Micozzie, as majority chairman of the House Transportation Committee, who guided the crucial legislation through the maze of politics and gamesmanship that serves as governing in Harrisburg. Micozzie was relentless in pushing the program, which will include a huge new revenue stream for SEPTA and mass transit, one of the keys to the regional economy that very often rubs politicians from other areas of the state the wrong way.

Micozzie previously served as head of the Insurance Committee at a time when health care costs were exploding and serious questions were being asked about the stateís insurance giants.

But the one issue likely closest to his heart ó as well as his constituentsí ó was education. Micozzie has been a constant, passionate voice raised in opposition to what is fundamentally an unfair, unlevel playing field that leaves those children most at risk, in poorer neighborhoods such as the William Penn School District, constantly behind their more well-to-do neighbors.

Micozzie was one of the first to speak out forcefully ó and publicly ó against a system that handicapped so many children simply by virtue of where they lived.

He championed his own program ó the Successful Schools Program ó to recalculate the way education funding is doled out in Harrisburg. It did not make him any friends, neither among Republicans nor here on his home turf in Upper Darby. But it was the right thing to do. Micozzie was quick to admit something his brethren in the Legislature would only begrudgingly admit ó poorer districts should get a bigger slice of the pie to even the playing field. His plan died on the vine, a victim of what even Micozzie would concede was a huge problem: That no politician wants to tell his constituents that they are going to get less from Harrisburg.

It is certainly something Micozzie rarely ever did.

Perhaps the best example of the way Micozzie routinely delivered for his constituents was a few years back when the Upper Darby School District was teetering on the brink of conflagration, with the community up in arms over proposed cuts in their beloved arts and music programs, in addition to deep cuts in staff.

It was Micozzie, along with his Democratic colleague Rep. Margo Davidson, D-164, who found the money to stave off the cuts. Not only that, but Micozzie made sure it was not a one-time deal, but rather money the district could count on year after year.

Micozzieís decision not to seek another term completes a remarkable change in the Upper Darby political scene, at least as it pertains to Harrisburg. First it was Republican Rep. Mario Civera who saw the changing demographic in his district and decided to get out, seeking and winning a seat on county council after representing Upper Darby for three decades. Davidson succeeded him in Harrisburg.

Now Micozzie is doing the same.

Democrat Vince Rongione has indicated that he is running for the seat.

And for the first time in nearly four decades, Republicans will be seeking someone other than Nick Micozzie to represent the 163rd.

You donít replace Micozzie, or what he delivered to Upper Darby and Delaware County.

Nick Micozzie always delivered the goods. That kind of clout is not replaced overnight.